SECRETARY'S REPORT. 27 



he should liave an opportunity to correct many of the state- 

 ments so well calculated to mislead, and I therefore give place 

 to the following communication : 



Dear Sir, — I wish to review, in as brief a manner as possible, 

 the minority report of F. D. Lincoln,. Commissioner on Conta- 

 gious Diseases of Cattle. Passing over the few first pages, in the 

 14th, he says, " There had been kept a pair of oxen belonging to 

 one Willard, of Ashby, which were supposed to have pleuro- 

 pneumonia. I say supposed, <fec." The facts are, and we had 

 the evidence of several persons, that while a pair of oxen was 

 being driven from Concord, Mass. to Stoddard, N. H., one of them 

 faltered and was evidently sick, — was put up at the Box Tavern 

 stable. Sometime after, a disease broke out in the said stable ; 

 a cow in the stable was sold to one Shelden, in Hancock, who 

 sold her to Washburn, who sold one from his herd to Hay ward," 

 a neighbor, who had lost eleven head of cattle at the time of 

 our visit to New Hampshire, he, Hayward, sold one to one 

 Hadley, of Peterborough, who owned the pair of oxen alluded 

 to in the majority report. Mr. Lincoln had the same oppor- 

 tunity to learn the above history of the spread of the disease 

 from the Box Tavern as I did. It is said that " there are none 

 so blind as those that won't see." 



At page 17th he says that Dr. Thayer examined (the cows at 

 Nelson's, in Lincoln) again and again and detected the disease 

 in one where the disease did not exist. It appears to me that 

 if a man wishes to overthrow an old theory, built upon an expe- 

 rience of five years, with all the evidence that could be obtained, 

 it would be far better to state facts, or at least to learn the facts, 

 so as to be able to state them. The truth is, I did examine 

 them again and again, and was unable to detect disease in but 

 three. The fourth, although liberally fed, did not thrive, the 

 owner often stating that she must be diseased. Knowing that 

 in many subjects the disease does exist, either in remote situa- 

 tions from the surface, or in so small a space that the usual 

 examinations fail to discover it, it was thought best to slaughter 

 the animal. So much for the statement so sneeringly made. 

 Again on the same page, Mr. Cutler complained of the loss he 

 should suffer by being deprived of so good a herd. It is not to 

 be wondered at that he should ; his herd originally consisted of 



